Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		5.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		3.5
Overall		4.0

Drinking Buddies Blu-ray Movie Review

Is the Room Spinning, or Is It Me?

Reviewed by Michael Reuben November 30, 2013

Writer/director Joe Swanberg's film Drinking Buddies left me with a lot of thoughts, but one of them was how useless the term "mumblecore" cinema has become. The so-called "godfather" of the movement, Andrew Bujalski, has denied both that it exists and that he makes "mumblecore" films. On the commentary track for Drinking Buddies, Swanberg says that he was trying to make the kind of low-budget drama that the studios used to make in the Sixties and Seventies, citing Paul Mazursky's Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice (1969) as a direct inspiration. European filmmakers still make low-budget, character-driven films, and no one feels the need to relegate them to a box with a dismissive label (although I suppose that, for some, just calling them "European" may be enough). Fish Tank and Weekend, to name two recent examples from the U.K., could just as easily qualify as "mumblecore" as Drinking Buddies. And yes, I deliberately chose two films from the Criterion Collection; that's the point.

The British connection is relevant in another regard, in that Swanberg's method resembles that of the great English director Mike Leigh, although Swanberg has a long way to go before he manages to assemble the amazing company of actors on whom Leigh has been reliably drawing for many years now. His story is written in advance, but none of the dialogue is scripted. The actors improvise according to a structure worked out in advance with the director, and they develop their own characters. Drinking Buddies was the most elaborately planned of Swanberg's films to date, because it is set in the world of "craft beer" brewing and much of it was shot in a functioning brewery, whose staff served as extras. Filming had to be coordinated with the brewery's operations, so that the crew had to know the scene's action in detail, even if the actors were inventing the dialogue on the spot. The result was a kind of focused, edgy energy that contributes immeasurably to Swanberg's tale of two couples who find themselves at crossroads in their relationships.

Kate (Olivia Wilde, TRON: Legacy) is the sole female worker at Revolution Brewing, a craft beer brewery in Chicago. Her boss, Gene Dentler (an uncredited Jason Sudeikis), refers to her as the face and voice of the company, because she arranges tastings, deals with distributors and handles all PR. Her long-time friend Luke (Jake Johnson, New Girl) also works at the brewery, and their relationship walks a fine line between buddies and flirtation.

Luke's live-in girlfriend of many years is a school teacher, Jill (Anna Kendrick, Up in the Air), who is the serious counterpart to Luke's perpetual goofball. It's the latter quality he shares with Kate. Kate, in turn, has been seeing a much older music producer, Chris (Ron Livingston, Office Space), who is either rediscovering his youth or playing a father figure—or both. He gives Kate books to read by Serious Authors like John Updike, which he obviously feels she needs.

These details, and many others, tumble out casually in conversation at work and at home, and some of them may not register until a second viewing. Unlike scripted dialogue, where details that reveal character are underlined and highlighted, revelations in Drinking Buddies slip in between gossip, chatter and ordinary behavior, but the actors understand what they're playing—and the undercurrents are always present in the scenes.

Things get interesting when Kate invites her boyfriend to a Revolution-sponsored party, and Chris, in turn, invites Luke and Jill to spend a weekend with them at his family's cabin on Lake Michigan. During those few days, Kate and Luke continue to explore their mutual affinity for silliness and goofing off, while Chris and Jill are surprised to discover in each other a shared taste for order, domesticity and neatness. Both of them end the weekend with a sense of discontent. Jill renews a conversation with Luke about marriage that has clearly been going on for some time. It is one of the film's most delicate and painful scenes, as each half of the couple dances delicately around a touchy subject, and neither gets exactly what he or she wants. Chris looks at Kate with new eyes, as if suddenly aware of the enormous gap in expectations that their age difference creates. He realizes that, beautiful as she is, he wants something else.

The last section of Drinking Buddies puts Kate and Luke to the test, as circumstances conspire to throw them together with every opportunity to cross the line from friendship to romance. Chris withdraws, and Jill departs for a teaching conference, leaving the two "buddies" ample time to spend together and numerous moments when either of them could reach just a little further and start something. What does each of them want? Wilde and Johnson give wonderfully naturalistic performances as two people who aren't used to taking anything seriously, but are suddenly brought up short by a serious question that neither of them can ignore.

The ending of the film has engendered enough discussion that Swanberg felt obliged to address it in his commentary. I'll say nothing more than that it was something he thought about carefully and chose deliberately, and at least this viewer found it wholly satisfying.

Drinking Buddies Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Drinking Buddies was shot with a Red camera by Ben Richardson, who had just completed his award-winning cinematography for Beasts of the Southern Wild. Swanberg is lavish in his praise for Richardson's grasp of his improvisational style of working, which required a lot of handheld camerawork that Richardson managed so smoothly that you're rarely aware of the operator's presence. (No "shakycam" here.)

With post-production completed on a digital intermediate, Magnolia Home Entertainment's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray was presumably sourced from digital files. The image is clean, noiseless and detailed, with excellent blacks and a naturalistic color palette that is particularly good at reproducing the gleaming brewery tanks and the spotless, well-maintained offices of Revolution Brewing. The browns and greens of the woods surrounding the cabin on the lake are beautiful to look at it, and the slightly frayed cabin interior has an appropriately faded look. There are no artifacts of any kind, and the average bitrate of 24.97 is more than adequate given the nature of the film, which involves primarily scenes of conversation.

Drinking Buddies Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Drinking Buddies' original 5.1 mix is presented as lossless DTS-HD MA, but it's not a fancy mix, nor should it be. This is a drama about character interactions, and except for some minor environmental ambiance, there is little for the surrounds to add. The dialogue is clear, and the music is a collection of songs assembled by music supervisor Chris Swanson. None of them were familiar to me, but they all fit the mood of the film perfectly.

Drinking Buddies Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Commentary with Writer/Director Joe Swanberg, Producers Andrea Roa and Alicia Van Couvering: Swanberg and his two producers make a point of opening beers as they begin their commentary, but there's no obvious sign of intoxication as they talk continuously during the film's 90-minute running time. Swanberg describes the origin of the project, working with the actors to develop the project and the tricky process of coordinating with the brewery staff. He is also eloquent in his praise for the chemistry that developed between the cast and cinematographer Ben Richardson, who operated the camera, so that the camera moves and the performances always remained in sync. He also discusses the film's ending, which he says was carefully thought out.



• Deleted Scenes/Outtakes with Director Commentary (1080p; 2.35:1; 7:15): The scenes are not listed individually. The director commentary is optional.



• Interviews (1080i; 1.78:1; 12:54): Each actor discusses his or her character and reasons for joining the project.
• Olivia Wilde
• Jake Johnson
• Anna Kendrick
• Ron Livingston



• AXS TV: A Look at Drinking Buddies (1080i; 2.35:1; 3:15): This is the usual AXS TV promo, using excerpts from the interviews listed above.



• All Things Drinking with Director Joe Swanberg and "Drinking Made Easy" Host Zane Lamprey (1080i; 1.78:1; 29:38): Swanberg is interviewed about making the film by comedian Lamprey, whose show appears on AXS TV. Much of the information here is repeated in the commentary.



• Behind the Scenes at Revolution Brewery (1080p; 1.78:1; 4:15): James Cibak, brewmaster at Revolution, gives a tour of the facility.



• Theatrical Trailer (1080p; 2.35:1; 2:31): As much as the trailer suggests about the style of the film, it really tells you very little about the story.



• Also from Magnolia Home Entertainment: The disc includes trailers for Prince Avalanche, Mr. Nobody, Syrup and Bad Milo, as well as a promo for AXS TV. These also play at startup, where they can be skipped with the chapter forward button.



• BD-Live: As of this writing, attempting to access BD-Live gave the message "Check back later for updates".

Drinking Buddies Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

It may be impossible to banish the term "mumblecore" from the vocabulary of film fans, to say nothing of reviewers (we are, by nature, addicted to categories), but a film like Drinking Buddies serves as a reminder that such labels don't tell us much. A good film is always more interesting and offers more substance than the category or genre to which it may appear on the surface to belong. Drinking Buddies is such a film. Highly recommended.